Fingers Crossed
by flickerswish
Summary: Keith has a lot on his mind. About this mission, about disguises, and definitely about Lance. The last of which he didn't expect to actually be on his mind and not in this way. A short fic written because the world always needs more of pining Keith and because those costumes were gone too soon.


p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;" When Keith first heard about wearing disguises to infiltrate a space mall, he cringed. The whole idea put together by Coran and it was pretty pointless. Nobody cared what anyone else here was there for, they all just assumed it was for the same reason that they themselves were there for: shopping. So really there wasn't even any need to infiltrate in the first place. If anything, wearing a disguise and walking around as if you have something to hide is even more suspicious./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;" Sure they were the paladin's of Voltron, legendary heroes dating back tens of thousands of years ago, but the chances of them being recognized by anyone and pursued were slim to none. Hardly anyone has even seen the faces of the paladins yet and those who did, well…Keith is having a hard time imaging Zarkon prowling the space mall for a new set of armor and a fancy pair of space shoes./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;" Keith sighs and picks up the mask on top of the pile of clothes Coran gave him and ponders just not wearing it. It looks like a ballroom mask only plain and grey and not flashy at all. Which is fine, Keith isn't about to don any gaudy clothing when the mission is about blending in and not making scene./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;" If he does decide not to wear it, there's always a chance Coran might be too preoccupied to notice the missing piece of Keith's disguise. But he can already hear Coran asking him about the mask clearly in his head and going on a spiel about how the mask is the most important part of Keith's outfit and how he picked them all carefully to match each of the paladins and just the thought alone is enough to convince Keith to wear it./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;" "Every part of this looks like it's been picked at randomspan style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;",/span" Keith scoffs. He's going to put the mask on last to minimize the amount of time he has to wear the offensive thing. Instead, the very first thing he puts on is the belt with empty money pouches. He has to adjust it so it fits with his own belt. Come to think of it, a second belt is so unnecessary, not to mention unpractical. He could just tie the money bags to his own belt but suppresses the desire./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;" The cape goes on next and while it's a little heavy, it's surprisingly not as heavy as it looks for having so much fabric. The thing about it that will, however, take some real getting used to it the way it hangs and clings to his legs when he turns. He imagines this is vaguely what wearing a dress feels like./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;" Actually, with the whole outfit on, it wasn't all that bad. The large shoulder pads were bulky and a little cumbersome but he could work with it. The gauntlets and kneepads added to the illusion of defense. In fact, it was starting to look less like it was put together at random and more like some thought went into it. Not a lot, but some. Besides, one look at Pidge's outfit and he felt a whole lot better about his own. Pidge's outfit like Coran ran out of stuff and put the rest together and it good. He felt a little bit bad for her on that. She looked ridiculous./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;" Pidge's bad outfit aside, Keith was actually starting to get motivated for the 'mission' now. Of course he realized that this was probably an excuse for Coran to dress up and get into mischief but Keith's willing to put that aside. He's ready to unnecessarily infiltrate the space mall like a band of thieves and spies./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;" It goes without saying though that he'll take his new found enthusiasm for the mission to the grave with him. He'd never hear the end of it if any of them found out, especially from Lance. That was kind of a worst case scenario to Keith. If he had an image he actually cared about and had to maintain it would definitely be ruined in event of his little secret being found out. It wasn't even much of a secret but still; Lance's mocking voice joined the imaginary Coran lecture and floated around in his head for awhile./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;" Speaking of taking Lance floating around in his head and things to the grave, Keith just so happened to notice that Lance's disguise looked…natural on Lance. He couldn't decide if his outfit was just put together exceptionally well or if it looked like that because it was on Lance. Keith was starting to wonder if Lance would look good in anything but that thought process was a slippery slope he'd like to stay away from./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;" /p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;" Still, He had to admit to himself that Lance looked good. He also very reluctantly admitted to himself that he had been thinking about it that now that he's noticed, Keith can't stop sneaking glances Lance's way. For what felt like the hundredth time in half a minute and despite having told himself repeatedly to stop staring, he shifts his line of sight from Coran to Lance./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;" As he felt himself sliding further down the rabbit hole, Keith could only thank Coran for the facemask now and the fact that he had decided to wear it after all because it helped hide his gaze from Lance. Even so, he should look away. If he stared too long, even Lance would notice something was amiss./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;" But even as Keith reasoned with himself, when Lance cocked his hip and talked flippantly with Coran, his usually irritating voice that this time made Keith's whole body sing, he felt a little bit more of his own self-presumed heterosexuality slipping away. Not like at this point there was much of that left. A heterosexual man wouldn't be losing his head over something so simple as a man's change of wardrobe./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;" And then Coran turns away and darts off and Keith's left with nothing to distract Lance from his inability to look away from him. And then Lance turns to him and Keith feels his heart stop./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;" "What?" Lance asks, his voice not hostile but suspicious. "You've been staring at me for awhile. What gives?"/p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;" "Nothing. It's just better than looking at Coran's moustache while he talks," Keith answers, complimenting himself on how calm his voice sounds instead of stuttering. That'd be a sure sign something's off. This way it's halfway convincing. In a steak of luck, when Lance opens his mouth to say something with doubt in his eyes it's interrupted by a cloth shuffling followed by shouting./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;" "True. It is disturbing and I span style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-weight: inherit; font-style: oblique; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: inherit; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; padding: 0px;"am /spaneasy on the eyes," Lance agrees and in that moment he has no idea how much Keith agrees with him right now about being easy on the eyes. Lance is very, very easy on the eyes. And then there's some rustling that finally distracts Keith from Lance./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;" "Oh thank God he's gone, I can finally take this stupid outfit off," Pidge says and Keith looks to his left just in time to see her slam dunking her disguise in a trash bin./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;" "Oh yeah, me too," Hunk says and when it seemed like everyone else were also going to take their disguises off, Keith joined in. He strips it off fast enough that his is second to make it to the trash bin actually. He felt a bit disappointment when Lance's outfit joined theirs in the trash bin but it was washed away by the hope that this meant he wouldn't be plagued by confusing thoughts about Lance anymore./p  
p style="border: 0px; outline: 0px; font-size: 15.12px; font-family: 'Lucida Grande', 'Lucida Sans Unicode', 'GNU Unifont', Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif; vertical-align: baseline; list-style: none; margin: 1.286em auto; padding: 0px; line-height: 1.5; color: #2a2a2a;" Finger's crossed that this would be the end of his momentary attraction to Lance./p 


End file.
